Kashmir’s apple economy cannot keep running on compensation forms and post-disaster surveys. 

Hailstorms strike orchards, officials conduct assessments, relief announcements follow, and growers return to the next season with deeper debt and thinner margins. Administrative procedure moves forward, but economic logic collapses.

That contradiction now sits at the center of one of India’s most important horticultural regions. 

Kashmir produces the bulk of the country’s apples during strong seasons and supports a vast economic chain tied to orchards, freight, cold storage, packaging, labour, transport, and rural commerce. Climate shocks now hit that system with growing frequency, while public policy still treats those shocks as temporary farm distress.

This economy demands a different framework. 

Serious commercial sectors function through risk management, infrastructure protection, and financial continuity planning. But Kashmir’s apple belt still depends heavily on relief economics.

The scale alone explains why this approach fails.

According to NITI Aayog, horticultural acreage in Jammu and Kashmir expanded from 1.31 lakh hectares in 1980 to 3.44 lakh hectares by 2022. Production climbed from 5.6 lakh metric tonnes to more than 27 lakh metric tonnes during the same period. Apples dominate that expansion. 

Industry and government estimates place Kashmir’s contribution at roughly three-fourths of India’s apple production during strong harvest years.

That system supports nearly 7 lakh farming families. Millions more depend on the secondary economy built around fruit movement and sales. Truck operators, mandi workers, carton manufacturers, commission agents, pesticide dealers, cold storage operators, seasonal labourers, and shopkeepers all depend on orchard income circulating through the valley.

This is economic infrastructure, which needs protection before collapse, rather than paperwork after damage.

Hail remains one of the most destructive commercial threats facing orchard economies. Timing makes the damage especially severe. 

Growers spend heavily during flowering and early fruit-set stages on........

© Kashmir Observer